


The Worlds Greatest Show.

by Spocksandshoes



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Cherno Alpha - Freeform, Developing Relationship, Dumb adorable soulmates, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Russian Cuties being cuties, Schmoop, Sexy Times, The Kaidanovskys - Freeform, circus AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-05
Updated: 2013-09-05
Packaged: 2017-12-25 17:45:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/955920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spocksandshoes/pseuds/Spocksandshoes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before they were world-famous Jaeger Pilots, they were Circus brats with bare feet  who were dumb and in love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Worlds Greatest Show.

It has always, for as long as he could remember, been Sasha.

It was Summer. Truzzi’s Circus had just passed Volograd on its yearly route. It had been this route ever since Aleksis could remember, but Sasha claimed that there used to be a different route, all the way down to Bratsk. He never knew if she was joking or not.

They skipped school on the last Friday of the month with some friends. The weather was warm, and instead of lessons, the circus brats snuck into the nearby city. Dimitri and Natasha took them to a park, where they skipped stones on the lake and loitered till they were shooed away by park security.  
The ice-cream they bought was sweet and sticky and the photo of her laughing with a smudge of chocolate ice-cream on her nose was tacked to his fridge for years to come.

*****

It was winter, and in Kazan, some guys are making fun of him. 

He was too-tall, even as a teenager, towering clumsily above people his own age and people much older, alike.  
‘’You one of the freaks in the show!?’’ One of the guys- a freckled redhead- jeered. Well, he tried to. Sasha punched him so hard that she broke the guys’ nose, and her knuckles were bruised for a week afterward. She wore the bruises proudly- and funnily enough, there were no more jokes about his height.  
Despite the biting weather, he felt warm inside for a few days after that.

*****

It was Spring, and he teases her about dying her hair. In return, she teases him about his deep voice, and makes him read things to her like he was on the news. 

She said he sounded like a voice-actor, and when she’s bedridden for a week with the flu, he comes and reads to her from her favourite Harry potter book, til she falls asleep, her blonde hair a mussed mess on the pillow.

*****

It was summer. The cages need cleaning, and of course, the assistant animal-trainer is the one gets the wonderful job of shovelling crap and cleaning the cages. 

He had grown tall and strong over the summers and winters since his early adolescence, and the aches and pains from carrying and cleaning had faded. He kind of liked it, getting to go around the back of the Chapiteau and spend some time feeding his animals, making sure they were okay.  
Sasha always went with him, flopped down outside in a hoodie that he could have sworn was once his- and handed him the feed, or fresh water, or just lazed around watching him work, like he did when she was practising her aerial stunts.  
She had never went inside the cages. Yet.

*****

It was late Summer. He sits in the centre of the clean-swept cage and crosses his legs, laughing as a whiskery face is pushed against his own.

‘’Hello Leo.’’  
The lions surrounded him, nuzzling his arms for attention, and curiously smelling around his pockets for any treats.  
It was easy to tell their personalities from what they did first, he always said.  
‘’Cchh. Go.’’ He waved a large hand, and they obediently uncurled themselves form him and padded over to the edges of the cage. Five grown lionesses and one lion, sitting patiently and waiting for his order. He felt his mouth tug into a broad smile. ‘’Good girls. And boy.’’  
Sasha was still when he held out his hand towards her.  
‘’You want me to step into a lions cage.’’

‘’Don’t worry, they know you.’’

‘’Enough to not tear my throat out?’’

He waited patiently, and of course, she didn't disappoint. Her jaw tightened in resolution, and with one last look at the lions in the corner, she unlocked the cage door and stepped inside.  
He had her sit on his crossed legs, leaning her back against his chest. She fit there perfectly, leaning back and making herself at home beside him.  
He had always been at home beside her.  
‘’Now....’’ He felt her muscles tense, heard the wary intake of breath as he called the lions back over... and then he felt her relax again when they were still alive, moments later.  
‘’This is Anya. That’s Leo, Artura,Dina, Mizzi, and Galina.’’

He felt her giggle in surprise when a rough tongue rasped over her cheek as Anya inspected the newcomer.  
‘’I know their names, Aleksis.’’

‘’Ah, but you’ve never been formally introduced, have you?’  
He nudged her side gently with his elbow, took her hands in his, and showed her how to pet the beasts properly.  
And the smile she gave when Leo let her run her fingers through his mane, well, Aleksis thought it was the best thing he had ever seen.

*****

It is spring. The smell of fresh sawdust is always intoxicating in the big tent, unmarred by footprints or mud or dropped popcorn. It is the excitement before a new show, the silence before the storm. Aleksis loves it.

He loved sitting there in the evenings before the show, when everyone else was asleep. He sat in the makeshift plastic seats, and stared up at the figure up near the top of the brilliant red-and-blue tarp of the Chapiteau.  
He’d sit there, large hands clasped over his worn jeans, and he’d watch her practise till he had a crick in his neck.  
‘’You don’t have to watch me.’’ She reminded him one night, strong fingers rubbing out the knots and kinks in his neck and shoulders. He had smiled sheepishly, and shook his head.  
‘’I like watching you.’’  
She had laughed delightedly, and rested her forehead against his spine.

Now, though, her bare feet had just left the wooden bridge. Powdered fingers found the metal frame, and she was off, letting go and almost soaring to the Corde pareille, swinging in an arc that looked just a fierce and competitive as it did graceful.  
When she was in sync with her siblings, it was something to watch, all three of them displaying such strength and skill, drawing ‘ooh’s and ‘aahs’ from the crowd with every spin and aerialist stunt.  
But he only had eyes for her, her hair shining like stardust in the bright lights. That red lipstick matching her leotard. Her eyes narrowed and focussed.  
When she was up there, the tent could have been on fire, and he wouldn’t have noticed.

*****

It is autumn when Dimitri pauses in juggling his knives to tell Aleksis that he looks like his uncle. 

He was right. The ring master was tall and burly, with dark hair and a magnificent beard. And Aleksis.. well, he wasn’t too far behind.  
That night, sitting on Sasha’s bed with her and her sister, eating Pelmini, he told them what Dimitri had said, and Sasha grinned, and eyed the bottle of blonde dye on her shelf.  
‘’Lets change that.’’

*****

It is winter when he stumbles and falls on a patch of ice outside the Menage. 

Ariana took over with the Animals as he healed, and Sasha kept him laughing by writing rude limericks on the plaster-cast on his arm whenever he fell asleep.  
He made her sign it properly, and they spent the evening sitting cross-legged on her bed, with her drawing cartoonish trees and lions and planets and whatever else she could think of on his cast, the two of them slowly getting high on the smell of sharpies.

*****

It is autumn.

‘’Do you remember the stance I thought you?’’ 

He did. Arms up, shoulders tensed. One leg bent, the side of his bare foot pressed against his other leg.  
She hooked her legs around the trapeze and flipped upside-down, stands of platinum-blonde hair failing from her braids.  
Then hands grasped his wrists, and his palms clung to the powered bandages on her arms.  
And then his feet left the wooden platform, and she was keeping him up, like it was nothing to lift this 7ft. giant.  
The first time they did this, he worried that she was going to break a wrist. Then, he stopped worrying. His Sasha had been doing this with her siblings for years, and her brother Anton was no lightweight.  
She could handle it.

And then he looked up, and she was looking down at him, her cheeks flushed with the blood rushing to her head.  
And she was staring into his eyes and the strain in his shoulders and arms didn’t matter anymore. They spun slowly, alone in the tent where they had grown up, playing chase between the seats and watching each other preform, and sharing stolen cigarettes in the Clowns’ alley out back, or napping together in the mess of tarp before the tent was set up. 

She was staring into his eyes like she could do it forever, and he couldn’t look away, remembering the first argument they had. The way it lasted for all of 14 minutes. Remembering how she looked when she was angry. Remembering the first time he cried in front of her, and she had held him all night, saying nothing.

And then, she lifted him.  
Sasha just... bent her elbows. The muscles in her upper arms pulled taut, and she yanked him up close, like it was nothing. And if he wasn’t already so in awe of her, that would have been surprising.  
And then her lips were against his, and oh, Aleksis was so in love.

*****

It is early summer, and Sasha is being handed an urn by her weeping sister.

One stupid drunk driver behind the wheel, and Anton had never made it back home. She was quiet until they got home, and it was only when he put his arms around her that she dissolved, a red-nailed fist cracking the wooden panelling of his trailer as she swore and shook and cried in his arms.

*****

It is late summer, and he finds her sitting with the lions, a crumpled poster by her feet.

He picks it up, smoothing out the advertisement for their circus. The picture on the front is Sasha and her siblings.  
He pockets the poster, sits beside her, and relishes in her tiny smile when Artura trusts her enough to let her cub crawl into her arms.

*****

It is Autumn, when she curlS her arms around his neck and whispers 'thank you' against his lips.

And Aleksis kissed her until they were both breathless, and they slept naked, curled up together, his head pillowed on her chest, and fingers curled in his hair.  
She had nothing to thank him for, he told her the next morning, causing her to grin as he ruffled her sleep-tousled hair. He would never have been anywhere else.

*****

It is spring, and she soaring on the trapeze again, knuckles white on the bar. 

Her sister was at her side, but the spot to her right, where Anton had been, was sorely empty.  
There were tears in her eyes, and her jaw was tight and determined, and Aleksis sat below, her heart bursting with pride.  
When her feet are back on solid ground he wraps his arms around her waist and kisses her,and she smiled against his lips.

*****

It is August, and the first Kaiju attacks.

It was August, and everyone was crammed into Aleksis’ uncles Caravan, staring in silence at the small television.  
The image of the demolished golden gate bridge stayed in Aleksis’ mind with a sort of numb horror.  
And then another attack came. And more people died.  
And then another.  
And then another.

They sat in silence, each time, staring at the tv with hands clasped so tight they left bruises.  
They were both tensed in fear and anger, watching attack after attack. 

And when the Jaeger programme opened up, they just looked at each other.

He goes to open his mouth but she grabs him and drags him close and growls how much she loves him against his lips and that’s it, the decision is made.  
She wraps her legs around his waist and he marks every inch of her skin he can reach with kisses.  
With every motion that rocks their bodies together, she says his name like it’s a prayer.

And oh, he’s lost in her voice, in her skin and her perfume and her strong arms. Utterly lost.

His aunt and Uncle ask him not to go. Her sister hugs her tight and told her that she had better not get herself killed. They go and drink with their friends one last time, and when he goes to see the Bears and the Lions, she picks up her brothers urn and hugs it to her chest, and asks him to watch over them.

It is spring, and they say their goodbyes to the only home they had ever known, pick up their bags, and walk away, their hands clasped tight.


End file.
